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Updated: Sep 13, 2025
Use of Hematopoietic Stem Cell Transplantation to Assess the Origin of Myelodysplastic Syndrome
Published on: October 3, 2018
Causal relationship between circulating cytokines and myelodysplastic syndrome: a Mendelian randomization study
Xia Wang1, Ye Zhang2, Xueqing Xu2
1Department of Laboratory Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Hebei North University, Zhangjiakou, People's Republic of China.
Objective:
Current research links cytokines to cancer occurrence and development. This study used Mendelian randomization (MR) to examine the causal relationship between circulating cytokines and Myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) onset.
Methods:
We analyzed 91 circulating cytokines as exposures and MDS genome-wide association study (GWAS) summary statistics as outcomes using a two-sample MR approach, with primary results derived from the IVW method. Robustness was assessed through heterogeneity, horizontal pleiotropy, and leave-one-out analyses.
Results:
In this study, T-cell surface glycoprotein CD6 isoform (OR = 1.247, 95% CI: 1.020-1.524, p = 0.031) and interleukin-24 (OR = 1.679, 95% CI: 1.056-2.669, p = 0.029) were positively associated with MDS risk, while cystatin D (OR = 0.778, 95% CI: 0.642-0.943, p = 0.010) and SIR2-like protein 2 (OR = 0.614, 95% CI: 0.385-0.979, p = 0.041) were negatively associated. These findings were stable in the sensitivity analysis.
Conclusions:
This MR study provides preliminary evidence that the genetically predicted levels of four circulating cytokines may influence the risk of developing MDS. The specific mechanisms require further exploration.
